Flight Safety Information
January 17, 2012 - No. 011
In This Issue
AirTran Ordered to Rehire Pilot Fired for Safety-Flaw Reporting
British Airways crew mistakenly announce that jet is going down
Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Receive Aviation's Highest Award
AMR seeks to extend deadline to file its scheduled assets and liabilities
Government Finds No Practical Solution To LightSquared GPS Interference
AMR seeks to extend deadline to file its scheduled assets and liabilities
Airbus May Open Final Assembly Line in U.S. to Lift Local Appeal
TSA Workers to Be Tested for Radiation Exposure at 100 Airports
AirTran Ordered to Rehire Pilot Fired for Safety-Flaw Reporting
Jan. 17 (Bloomberg) -- AirTran Airways, a unit of Southwest Airlines Co., was ordered by
the U.S. to rehire and pay more than $1 million in back wages to a pilot fired in 2007
after reporting mechanical flaws.
The airline violated whistle-blower protection laws when it dismissed the pilot after a
sudden increase in his reports detailing mechanical failures, the Occupational Safety and
Health Administration said today in a statement.
The agency is also requiring the Orlando, Florida-based airline to pay the pilot, who
wasn't identified by the agency, back wages, plus interest and compensatory damages,
according to the statement.
An agency investigation found reasonable cause to believe the termination was an act of
retaliation by the airline in violation of the law, OSHA said in the statement.
"Airline workers must be free to raise safety and security concerns, and companies that
diminish those rights through intimidation and retaliation must be held accountable,"
David Michaels, the head of OSHA, said in the e-mailed statement.
The pilot in a complaint said AirTran removed him from flight status in August 2007
following a "sudden spike in the pilot's mechanical malfunctioning reports," the agency
said in the statement. The airline held a 17-minute investigative hearing. Seven days
later, the company fired him, saying he didn't satisfactorily answer questions about a
jump in reports.
The safety agency, part of the Labor Department, found that the pilot didn't refuse to
answer questions at the hearing, answers to the questions were appropriate, and the
airline's actions were retaliatory.
AirTran didn't immediately respond to a request for comment on the U.S. order.
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British Airways crew mistakenly announce that jet is going down
(CNN) British Airways cabin crew sparked panic by mistakenly activating an emergency
announcement that said the plane was going down, and passengers should brace for a
water landing.
The message on the Miami-London flight reportedly said: "This is an emergency, we will
shortly be making an emergency landing on water."
A flight attendant came on the public address system about 30 seconds later to
apologize, saying the message was played by mistake, according to the Daily Mail.
A spokesman for the airline confirmed the incident and said: "The cabin crew canceled
the announcement immediately and sought to reassure customers that the flight was
operating normally."
However, the experience was far from normal according to a father from Edinburgh,
Scotland, who told Britain's Daily Telegraph that:
"It was about 3 a.m.. An alarm sounded and we were told we were about to land in the
sea. I thought we were going to die.
"My wife was crying and passengers were screaming. Then they played an
announcement telling us to just ignore the warnings."
Another passenger told the paper that: "When we landed they were handing out letters
apologizing, but it was the worst experience of my life. I don't think BA should get away
with this."
Duncan and Tracey Farquharson, of London, meantime, said the airline trivialized the
fear of passengers by issuing a "blasť" apology and failing to explain how the error
occurred until the plane arrived at Heathrow.
"We were about three hours into the flight when an automated message came over the
[public address system] saying: 'This is an emergency, we will shortly be making an
emergency landing on water,'" Farquharson reportedly said. "We looked at each other
and figured we were both about to die. Families with children were distraught and people
were in tears. It was very distressing."
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Boeing 787 Dreamliner to Receive Aviation's Highest Award
DENVER, Jan. 17, 2012 /NEWS.GNOM.ES/ - Few aircraft since the Wright Flyer have
truly become an "Aircraft of Legend." Like the DC-3, the technological advancements of
the Boeing 787 Dreamliner are expected to profoundly impact commercial aviation. The
Living Legends of Aviation have chosen the Boeing 787 Dreamliner to receive the
"Aircraft of Legend Award" which will be presented at the 9th Annual Living Legends of
Aviation Awards to be held January 20th at the Beverly Hilton in Los Angeles, Calif. Mr.
Scott Fancher, VP and General Manager of the Boeing 787 Program, will be accepting the
award on behalf of all who have contributed to the "Boeing Dreamteam." The Living
Legends of Aviation Annual Awards is the most important and prestigious recognition
event of aviation.
On December 17, 1903 at 10:31 am with Orville at the controls and Wilbur running
along side steading the wing, the world experienced the first controlled powered
flight. Exactly 100 years later the Living Legends of Aviation organization was born to
celebrate and recognize significant contributions for the second hundred years of
aviation.
The "Living Legends of Aviation" are a group of extraordinary people of accomplishment.
They are defined as aviation entrepreneurs, innovators, record breakers, astronauts,
industry leaders, pilots who have become celebrities and celebrities who have become
pilots.
For more information please visit http://www.LivingLegendsofAviation.org.
http://news.gnom.es/news/boeing-787-dreamliner-to-receive-aviations-highest-award
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AMR seeks to extend deadline to file its scheduled assets and liabilities
American parent AMR has asked the court handling its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case for a
30-day extension to 27 February to file certain items related to its assets and liabilities.
Specifically the company has asked for an extension for the filing of its scheduled assets
and liabilities, statement of financial affairs and schedules of executory contracts and
unexpired leases.
AMR said although it has commenced the task of gathering the necessary information to
file the various statements, "it will not be possible for the debtors to complete and filed
the schedules and statements by January 27, 2012".
The company explained the information necessary to complete is filing is "voluminous
and is located in numerous places throughout the world in the debtors' organization.
Collecting the necessary information requires the debtors, their employees, and their
professionals to expend an enormous amount of time and effort".
A hearing on AMR's motion to extend the filing period is scheduled for 27 January.
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
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Government Finds No Practical Solution To LightSquared GPS Interference
After a review of the latest round of tests of the GPS interference potential of
LightSquared's proposed wireless network, the National Space-Based Positioning,
Navigation and Timing (PNT) Executive Committee has found "both LightSquared's
original and modified [plans] would cause harmful interference to many GPS receivers."
Further, FAA analysis concludes that LightSquared's proposals are not compatible with
several GPS-dependent aircraft safety-of-flight systems, says a letter to the U.S.
Commerce Department signed by committee co-chairs Ashton Carter, deputy secretary
of Defense, and John Porcari, deputy secretary of Transportation.
"Based upon this testing and analysis, there appear to be no practical solutions or
mitigations that would permit the LightSquared broadband service, as proposed, to
operate in the next few months or years without significantly interfering with GPS. As a
result, no additional testing is warranted at this time," the letter says.
Harbinger Capital, LightSquared's parent, immediately issued a statement saying that
the committee's conclusions are "invalid."
Harbinger contends that "the devices chosen by GPS manufacturers to be tested were
selected to ensure failure. They included obsolete GPS receivers (some a decade out of
production) and niche-market receivers. This is nothing more than a thinly-veiled
attempt by government agencies to protect the interests of the GPS industry who are
unauthorized users infringing on spectrum licensed to LightSquared."
Harbinger also called for additional testing, which is unlikely in light of the PNT Executive
Committee statement, which said, "Substantial federal resources have been expended
and diverted from other programs in testing and analyzing LightSquared's proposals,"
and that further testing was not justified.
http://www.aviationweek.com
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AMR seeks to extend deadline to file its scheduled assets and liabilities
American parent AMR has asked the court handling its Chapter 11 bankruptcy case for a
30-day extension to 27 February to file certain items related to its assets and liabilities.
Specifically the company has asked for an extension for the filing of its scheduled assets
and liabilities, statement of financial affairs and schedules of executory contracts and
unexpired leases.
AMR said although it has commenced the task of gathering the necessary information to
file the various statements, "it will not be possible for the debtors to complete and filed
the schedules and statements by January 27, 2012".
The company explained the information necessary to complete is filing is "voluminous
and is located in numerous places throughout the world in the debtors' organization.
Collecting the necessary information requires the debtors, their employees, and their
professionals to expend an enormous amount of time and effort".
A hearing on AMR's motion to extend the filing period is scheduled for 27 January.
Source: Air Transport Intelligence news
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Airbus May Open Final Assembly Line in U.S. to Lift Local Appeal
Jan. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Airbus SAS, whose parent lost out in a U.S. tender to supply
refueling aircraft to Boeing Co., may add a final assembly line in the U.S. to buoy sales
in the world's No. 1 market for single-aisle planes, an executive said.
The European planemaker, which has final assembly lines in Toulouse, France, and
Hamburg, Germany, as well as Tianjin, China, may find that adding a similar operation in
the U.S. increases visibility with potential clients, Hans Peter Ring, chief financial officer
of Airbus parent European Aeronautic, Defence & Space Co., said today in an interview.
While the Asia Pacific region is the most promising market for future sales of large, wide-
body planes, North America is the single-biggest market for short- to medium-haul ones
such as Airbus's A320. With North American carriers needing to replace thousands of
aircraft in coming years, the European planemaker could have a commercial advantage
in showing customers that its models are put together locally.
"The U.S. market is for the foreseeable future the biggest single-aisle market in the
world, so there is some logic to be in the U.S.," said Ring after EADS and Airbus officials
gave briefings in Hamburg on the business outlook for 2012.
"It's certainly something that new management will need to look at."
EADS Chief Executive Officer Louis Gallois is retiring in May after the annual shareholder
meeting and is expected to be succeeded by Tom Enders, now chief of Airbus. EADS
shareholders Daimler AG and Lagardere SCA have held off on final decisions about the
shape of future management.
"I have to tell you there is no decision at all," Ring said. He declined to comment on the
specifics of the management succession or whether he expected to retain his position as
CFO of EADS.
U.S. Inroads
Airbus last year broke Boeing's two-decade stranglehold on supplying AMR Corp.'s
American Airlines, with an order for its A320neo, a single-aisle plane offering more fuel-
efficient engines. It lost out in a contest with Boeing to supply Delta Air Lines Inc. and is
currently competing against Boeing to win an order from UAL Corp.'s United Airlines.
United is looking at the purchase of as many as 200 jets.
North America is "critical" for the sale of single-aisle planes, Airbus CEO Enders said
today. Airbus had hoped to use the sale of refueling tankers as a beachhead to build a
commercial aircraft assembly line in Mobile, Alabama, though it lost the tanker contract
to Boeing.
"Just look at the global market forecast figures: more than 80 percent of all deliveries
forecast until 2020 in North America are single aisles. And for the next 20 years, America
in terms of the number of aircraft delivered will still be ahead of China," said Enders.
Production Plans
Airbus has been building production toward the rate of 42 single-aisle planes a month by
the end of this year. The company had aimed to make a decision on whether to push
that to 44 a month, though has held off, Enders said, as it studies whether the supply
chain can handle the extra burden.
"The supply chain ramp-up isn't a walk in the park," Enders said today. "That'll be a
huge challenge to our people in 2012 as well."
Airbus has an extensive network of suppliers in the U.S., though that offers less visibility
than a site piecing together components and rolling planes out onto the runway, Ring
said. It's not completely clear whether having an assembly line in the U.S. would actually
help win customers, as it clearly does in China. The difference in China is that the
government is a shareholder in the airlines, he said.
"The question is, and I think it has no answer, 'Would you sell more airplanes?' Ring
said.
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TSA Workers to Be Tested for Radiation Exposure at 100 Airports
The first clue suggesting the TSA was indeed going to test for radiation exposure among
its workers came last month when the TSA requested government vendors to provide
wearable personal dosimeters. These devices measure exposure to radiation. Unlike
member states of the European Union, which have stopped using body scanner
machines, fearing potential exposure over time to passengers and workers, TSA testing
for exposure will focus only on airport security officers to see if they are being exposed
to dangerous levels of radiation while working the scanners.
John Pistole, TSA administrator and TSA spokesperson Nico Menendez have offered
explanations as to why passangers will not be tested nor will body scanner machines be
re-tested. According to Menendez and Pistole,"Scanners have been tested and approved
by the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health as well as by the U.S. Army
Public Health Command." Pistole has stated that "he has received a draft report from the
inspector general of the Homeland Security Department that confirmed the conclusion of
previous independent studies that the scanners are safe for passengers."(Hugo Martin,
www.latimes.com1/16/2012)
The TSA decision and framing of the issue of cancer potential from airport screening
machinery differs from that of the European Union On November 15, 2011. The E.U.
announced that use of X-Ray body scanners will be prohibited. Fearing any potential for
security measures increasing cancer risk, the European Union declared that it will switch
to scanners that use radio frequency waves which have not been linked to cancer. The
new ruling was administered by the European Commission, which enforces policies of the
27 nation member nations of the European Union. The Commission stated that the new
ruling was adopted "in order not to risk jeopardizing citizen health and safety. (Ellen
Cannon, examiner.com 11/16/2011)
Body scanners have resulted in significant public controversy in the U.S. Much of that
controversy pitted concerns over national security terror risks with privacy and health
and safety. (Michael Grabell,ProPubica.com)More recently, health concerns have
emerged as an additional issue regarding the use of body scanners in U.S. airports.
Regarding cancer concerns, A ProPublica/PBS News Hour investigation in November,
2011 found that "X-ray body scanners use ionizing radiation, a form of energy that has
been shown to damage DNA and cause cancer." The investigation did emphasize that
the levels of radiation were "extremely low, equivalent to the radiation a person would
receive in a few minutes of flying." The investigation further noted that "several research
studies have concluded that a small number of cancer cases would result from scanning
hundreds of millions of passengers a year (ProPublica, 10/15/11)
The upcoming testing by TSA will only examine radiation exposure at 100 airports and
only of TSA workers who run the machines or work near the machines. The x-Ray
scanners banned by the EU are presently used at Chicago O'Hare International Airport.
Other metropolitan airports that use the scanners banned by the EU include Los Angeles
International Airport and JFK International Airport.
The TSA's technical term for these scanners is "backscatter "scanners. Half of U.S.
airports use "millimeter-wave-scanners" which like the EU's are based on radio
frequency waves. American airports using this technology include, Dallas, Atlanta, and
San Francisco.
Critics of the TSA support the idea of testing TSA workers but they remain concerned as
to the potential health risks for passengers who are not being tested. "James Babb, co-
founder of "We Won't Fly", a consumer advocacy group stated, "We still have no idea
how much radiation is being imposed on travelers by a properly functioning machine A
malfunctioning machine could be particularly dangerous." (www.latimes.com1/16/2012)
http://www.examiner.com/homeland-security-in-chicago/tsa-workers-to-be-tested-for-
radiation-exposure-at-100-airports
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Curt Lewis, P.E., CSP, FRAeS
CURT LEWIS & ASSOCIATES, LLC